Fortress Press

Treasures Old and New: Images in the Lectionary

Treasures Old and New

Images in the Lectionary

Gail Ramshaw (Author)

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In Treasures Old and New Gail Ramshaw illuminates forty primary images from the three-year lectionary. With each of the images she considers related terms, exploring a total of nearly two hundred words and phrases in light of biblical history, typological relationships, poetic nuances, metaphoric meanings, and liturgical year connections.

Sample constellations of images include:
  • Creation: beginning, creation, firstborn, new creation, virgin birth
  • Fire: ashes, burning bush, fire, tongues
  • Light: blindness, darkness, day, light, morning star, night, sight, star, sun
  • Treasure: gifts, gold-frankincense-myrrh, pearl, rich fool, treasure, widow's coin
  • Water: exodus, flood, Jordan, river, sea, water, well
Treasures Old and New offers a guide to rich symbolic speech for those who preach and teach, yet remains accessible and inviting to the reader seeking a resource for devotion and meditation on the scriptures. Extensively indexed to support the Revised Common Lectionary as well as the Roman Catholic lectionary.
  • Publisher Fortress Press
  • Format Paperback
  • ISBN 9781451486124
  • Dimensions 6 x 9
  • Pages 480
  • Publication Date March 15, 2014

Endorsements

"Treasures Old and New is indeed a treasure trove for all who seek to open up the riches of scripture for themselves and their congregations."

— Ruth Duck, Professor of Worship, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary

"Never has the lectionary come so alive as in these pages. This work itself is a treasure, lavishly unfolding forty major images that flow as lifeblood through the scriptures appointed for liturgical use. Gail Ramshaw's rare combination of literary, liturgical, biblical, and spiritual insight illuminates how images are the heart of the matter for pondering and proclaiming the gospel in our time. This book is a joy to read, and an immensely generative resource for all who preach and plan worship across the ecumenical spectrum."
— Don E. Saliers, William R. Cannon Professor of Theology and Worship, Candler School of Theology

"Preachers know that going from the world of the Bible to the world they and their bearers inhabit is by no means easy. Often they resort to anecdote, whimsy, or trivial example to achieve the transition. Gail Ramshaw has shown a more excellent way. Her treasury of images, unlocked and freely given, is either biblical or biblically derived. Here is a bridge on which to travel form the lectionary readings to the active minds in the pews. Like the Ponte Vecchio over the Arno with its rich array of ships, this bridge of images will help carry worshipers from the scriptural word to the things their thoughts have been on all week long."
— Gerard Sloyan, Professional Lecturer, Catholic University of America and Georgetown University

"Treasures Old and New provides a feast of ever-deepening biblical images, each uniquely proclaiming the profound mercy of our Trinitarian God. Gail Ramshaw shows how these images are treasures that help to form the community of faith. Using mysticism and metaphor, theology and history, biology and psychology, undergirded by both feminist and orthodox insight, Ramshaw skillfully draws the reader into the intimate connections of scripture, symbol, and liturgy. In a world of frequent liturgical confusion and burgeoning biblical illiteracy, Treasures Old and New comes as a welcome lantern, shedding light for the journey."
— Diane Jacobson, Professor of Old Testament, Luther Seminary

Excerpts

"Which are the most often recurring images in the lectionary? What is the history of the meaning of these images, before, within, and outside the Bible? What has been their usage during the centuries of Christian liturgical use? In a culture far distant from that in which they arose, can these images can still speak of mercy and challenge to God's people?...I see the three readings of each Sunday and festival as a treasure that we, like the Matthean householder in chapter 13, take from our storehouse, treasures that although old are able to be new each week."
— from the foreword to Treasures Old and New

Table of Contents

Foreword
Abbreviations

INTRODUCTION
The Three-Year Lectionary
Images
The Images in the Lectionary
Using This Volume

FORTY IMAGES
Battle
Body
City
Clothing
Covenant
Creation
Cross
Day of the Lord
Emanation of the Divine
Family
Fire
Fish
Food
Garden
Harvest
Heaven-Earth-Hell
Israel
Journey
Judge
Kingdom
Light
Marriage
Mother
Mountain
Name of God
Outsider
The Poor
Prophet Resurrection of the Body
Sacrifice
Servant
Shepherd
Spirit
Temple
Treasure
Tree
Water
Week
Wind
Wisdom

AFTERWORD

APPENDIXES AND INDEXES
Revised Common Lectionary Images
Roman Lectionary (Revised) Index
Biographical Appendix and Index
Acknowledgments and Endnotes
Bibliography
Index of Images and Liturgical Terms
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